FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Thousands of young people to march on Wednesday Nov 15 in Corbyn-backed Free Education demonstration

Comes immediately following the Tories’ U-turns and defeats over tuition fees, with young people strengthening Labour’s political weight in Parliament

Thousands of young people and students will march in London on Wednesday to demand an end to tuition fees, backed by Momentum and Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader.

Organised by the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts (NCAFC), the march seeks to capitalise on the surge in popularity of free education following its prominence in the general election that wiped out the government’s majority, and the Tories’ defeat on tuition fees in September.

The demonstration will demand the abolition of tuition fees, full non-means tested living grants for all students and an end to the wave of job cuts that are affecting universities and colleges across the country.

Organisers expect more than ten thousand students to attend, with Corbyn having urged young people to join the march. More than 60 student unions and colleges are actively mobilising across the country including Durham, Oxford and Cambridge and students are travelling to London from as far as Aberdeen, Bangor and Falmouth.

The demonstration follows significant student mobilisations in 2014 when 10,000 students attended a demonstration in support of scrapping tuition fees, and the recent NUS campaign to boycott the National Student Survey which was backed by 25 universities including Warwick, Oxford and Cambridge.

In a video posted on social media, Corbyn said “Everybody should have access to high quality from the cradle to the grave, without being forced into debt and anxiety. No one should be shut out. That’s why I support the demonstration for free education organised by NCAFC. And Labour in government will deliver it.”

Hansika Jethnani, an NCAFC organiser, said, “We refuse to lie down in the face of the government’s relentless attacks on education. Tuition fees are fundamentally illegitimate – education is a public good – not a product – and it should be funded by progressive taxation on the rich. The orthodoxy that students can be charged more and more has been shattered.”

Chris Townsend, a student at Sheffield and first time demonstrator, said, “We’re already winning the argument for scrapping tuition fees. Now we’re going do the same for universal living grants for all and an end to campus cuts. It’s young people that drove Corbyn’s Labour leadership election and took away the Tories’ majority – and it will be through us that a Labour government will be able to create a properly funded, free education system with living grants for all.”

ENDS

NOTES

For more information and interviews please contact Andy Warren on 07752640847 or Mark Crawford on 07891574894

The demonstration is organised by the National Campaign Against Fees & Cuts (NCAFC), a network of students and education workers founded in 2010, and backed by Momentum.

There will be a press conference on the day of the demonstration at 12 noon in the Conference Room, 2nd floor of the Bloomsbury Theatre Building WC1H 0AH. To RSVP or for more information, please email [email protected] or ring Andy on 07752 640 847.